It has been suggested that the secure storage of elongate articles has been a problem for many years, leading to much expenditure of inventive effort. For example, there may be problems in storing accessories for power tools such as electric drills, saws, and drivers. These accessories include drill bits, cutting bits, driver bits and chuck keys. Often, these accessories are relatively small and thus easy to misplace. These small elongate accessories are critical to the performance of the power tool, however, so they must be stored securely while still allowing ready access.
Users of power tools often store these accessories in the original packaging of the power tool or the accessory. This approach is less than desirable when the package is missing, destroyed, or otherwise rendered inoperative. Worse yet, some users simply throw these accessories into a large toolbox, where they can be lost or damaged.
Numerous other applications exist where the secure and reliable storage of elongate articles is desired. Examples include storing pens, pencils, rulers, scissors, screw drivers, wrenches, combs, keys, screws, toothbrushes, air pressure gauges, shaving devices, razors, paint brushes, thermometers, medical instruments, nail clippers, computer accessories and bobby pins in applications ranging from desk top to work shop to automobile to kitchen to bathroom to business to medical to sporting to construction. This list is not comprehensive, but merely touches on the potential elongate articles and the potential applications where secure and reliable storage of elongate articles is desired.
The art has addressed these shortcomings in the storage of elongate accessories by providing several devices. Although these devices are improvements, they frequently rely upon elastic members to retain the elongated articles. These elastic members, however, suffer from several shortcomings. For example, some prior art may use loops or tubes of elastic material to retain an article. Typically, the loops or tubes of elastic have a consistent diameter that requires the article being held to be larger in diameter than the loop or tube. As such, it is often difficult to insert the article into the loop or tube because it must be forced through the smaller diameter loop or tube. Working an article of a larger diameter into the opening of a smaller diameter loop or tube can therefore be a frustrating, complicated and time-consuming process. Further, articles that may be easily inserted into the loop or tube cannot be securely and reliably held because the diameter of the article is smaller than the diameter of the loop or tube. Elongate articles of smaller diameter than the loop or tube may be held in a horizontal position, but not be securely held at angles or in the vertical position without the assistance of other devices, like stops. Thus, prior art devices typically rely on the elongate article having a larger diameter than the opening of the loop or tube in order to securely and reliably hold the article.